Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Guest Post: 8 to be Great and 21st Century Skills

Guest post by Harry Tennant

Richard St. John's, The 8 Traits Successful People Have in Common: 8 to be Great is the distillation of a large number of interviews with successful people into the most critical lessons for success. He interviewed about 500 successful people in diverse fields and collected additional interviews of successful people, compiling a big database on their thoughts on the keys to success.

St. John identified about 300 traits and from those, he identfied eight major traits, shared most widely. The eight traits are listed below.

1. Passion: Successful people love what they do
2. Work: They work very hard
3. Focus: They focus on one thing, not everything
4. Push: They keep pushing themselves
5. Ideas: They come up with good ideas
6. Improve: They keep improving themselves and what they do
7. Serve: They serve others something of value
8. Persist: They persist through time, failure and adversity

One of the interesting characteristics of these traits is that they are not inate. They are thought to be learnable, which suggests that they can help nearly anyone achieve their success in their lives.

The Partnership for 21st Century Skills advocates teaching and assessing students on skills that go beyond the typical core curriculum. The 21st Century Skills include

• Creativity and innovation
• Critical thinking and problem solving
• Communication and collaboration
• Flexibility and adaptability
• Initiative and self-direction
• Social and cross-cultural skills
• Productivity and accountability
• Leadership and responsibility

This list of skills certainly looks like good skills for students to acquire. But if St. John is correct, and his list of traits are the most critical for success, what are the right skills to teach?

• Should we teach how to find and pursue a passion (found to be the most critical trait of successful people)?
• Should we teach students how to focus and minimize distractions?
• Should we teach students how to persist on long-term projects and how to overcome disappointments?
• Should we teach students how to assess whether a piece of work is actually useful to and serves others and how to make it even more valuable to others?

It is debatable, of course, whether St. John's eight traits are truly the most important. But if we assume for a moment that they are, shouldn't we teach students to acquire the traits for success?

Posted at 9:44 PM (permalink) 3 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: by Harry Tennant, Success

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Pass It On Education Tools: EDS Commercials

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Keywords: Pass It On, Pass It On Education Content, EDS, Commercials, Staff Development

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

In The News: Teacher & Students Held Hostage By Classmate in Wisconsin

Posted at 7:50 AM (permalink) 1 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: In The News, School Violence, Weapons, Crisis Planning, Counseling

Monday, November 29, 2010

Pass It On Education Tools: TED

In an earlier post, Harry shared a video of a talk by Sugata Mitra on Child-Driven Education.  The video was downloaded from TED, "a small nonprofit devoted to Ideas Worth Spreading."

This is a follow-up post about TED. 

Check It Out!  Pass It On!

"The annual TED conferences, in Long Beach/Palm Springs and Oxford, bring together the world's most fascinating thinkers and doers, who are challenged to give the talk of their lives (in 18 minutes).

More than 700 TEDTalks are now available, with more added each week.

We believe passionately in the power of ideas to change attitudes, lives and ultimately, the world. So we're building here a clearinghouse that offers free knowledge and inspiration from the world's most inspired thinkers, and also a community of curious souls to engage with ideas and each other."

Posted at 2:37 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Pass It On Education Tools, Pass It On, TED

Monday, November 29, 2010

Education Funny: Things Aren't Always As They Appear!

Someone sent this to me years ago.  If you have something like this, anything you'd like to share that is related to education, please email me at dan.s.martin@edclick.com!

Download a larger copy of this here.

Posted at 2:36 PM (permalink) 1 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Education Funny

Monday, November 29, 2010

Pass It On Education Content: In What Way Is An Individual Smart?

One huge challenge we have as educators is determining in what way each individual student is unique and how we can utilize that determination to better educate each student as an individual, rather than educating individuals how the group best learns.  This is obviously foundational to differentiation...and it just makes sense.

We have all met students who think they are "smart" or "dumb" or somewhere in between, without much basis for this determination and certainly without any nuance.  We are wise as educators to remind students that intelligence is a complex thing.  We shouldn't paint with too broad a stroke when assessing anyone's intelligence.

We are all familiar with different learning styles.  I like this easy to access two-page overview for determining "how" a student is smart.  This is a truncated copy for illustration only.  To download the complete document in Word, click here!

Check It Out!  Pass It On!

Posted at 9:41 AM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Pass It On, Intelligence, Differentiation

Sunday, November 28, 2010

Trends: Longer School Days

Extended school days under consideration in District public system

Washington Post
Sunday, November 7, 2010

"The two Southeast Washington middle schools are less than a mile apart. The real distance that separates them is the number of hours their students spend in class each week.

 

At Johnson Middle School, the day is 61/2 hours, 8:45 a.m. to 3:15 p.m. Students at AIM Academy, a KIPP charter school, stay for nine hours, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Thursday, and 71/2 hours on Friday. That doesn't count the mandatory 15 days of summer school and numerous four-hour Saturday sessions. In all, AIM kids spend 40 percent more time in class than their D.C. public school peers.

 

Longer school days are expensive and complicated to execute, requiring buy-in from teachers, parents, after-school programs and child-care providers. And the evidence that extended schedules actually improve academic performance is mixed at best.

 

But new support for a school calendar that breaks the traditional 61/2-hour, 180-day mold may force the District to give the idea more serious consideration. President Obama and Education Secretary Arne Duncan have called for longer days and shorter summer breaks. And school districts across the country are experimenting with extended days, especially as a way to help low-income students."

 For the full article click here.

Posted at 9:58 AM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: School Calendar, School Day, School Length, Extended School Day, Extended Day, AIM, KIPP

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Guest Post: Coach Wooden's Pyramid of Success

Guest post by Harry Tennant

Although John Wooden thought of himself as a teacher, as the head basketball coach at UCLA, he was the winningest coach in college basketball. Yet, he never mentioned winning to his players.

Winning is something you don't have control over, but you do have control over yourself. Coach Wooden defined success this way:

Success is peace of mind which is a direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you made the effort to become the best of which you are capable.

He emphasized to his players that success is the result of a set of habits which he called the Pyramid of Success as shown below.

I highly recommend his book, Wooden on Leadership. Despite its title, it's not just a book about business leadership and despite its author, it's not a book about sports. It's a book about the habits of character that lead to success: doing the best of which you're capable. It's a great message to pass on to students as well as great advice on how to set an example for the students and staff you work with.

Posted at 8:42 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: by Harry Tennant, Success

Friday, November 26, 2010

Guest Post: Fighting obesity at school and at home

Guest post by Harry Tennant

This is a follow-on to Dan's previous post on nutrition.

You may know Jamie Oliver as the Naked Chef on the Food Channel. (It's not that the chef is naked, the food is...free of excess fat, sugar, salt, preservatives and other chemicals.) He has an excellent talk in which he discusses the seriousness of the obesity epidemic and a simple approach to a solution: teach children about food and have everyone learn to cook ten healthy, easy recipes...and then pass the recipes on.

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/eng/jamie_oliver.html

One of his slides is really good. It shows causes of death in the US and highlights the causes that are linked to diet in red. The little bar way down at the bottom of the graph is for homocide, which gets so much attention in the news. The vastly bigger red bars, diet-related causes of death, get far less attention.

What does this have to do with education? A large part of the problem is failing to understand just how our diet is actually killing us (see graph above) and what we can do about it. Education can fix that.

In the spirit of Jamie Oliver's suggestion that we share good recipes, what is a favorite recipe of yours that's delicious, inexpensive, healthful and easier than drive-through burgers or ordering a pizza?

Posted at 7:59 PM (permalink) 2 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: by Harry Tennant, Jamie Oliver, Nutrition

Friday, November 26, 2010

Pass It On Education Content: Think Before You Post

This is a 40-second PSA with an important message for our young people to see and hear, repeatedly. 

Download this video by clicking here.

Check It Out!  Pass It On!

Posted at 6:48 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Pass It On Education Content, PSA, Internet Safety

Friday, November 26, 2010

Pass It On Education Tools: Tagxedo

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Keywords: Pass It On, Pass It On Education Tools, Tagxedo

Friday, November 26, 2010

In The News: Alleged Trade School Corruption

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Keywords: Trade School, In The News

Friday, November 26, 2010

Money Out There: Lego Children's Fund Grant

Posted at 8:52 AM (permalink) 2 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Money Out There, Money, Legos, Lego Grant

Thursday, November 25, 2010

Funny For The Holiday: There Are Just Some Times We All Appreciate Family More!

Posted at 10:56 AM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Just Funny, cartoon, family

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

In The News: Texas Adopts Stricter Rules About Teacher-Student Communication

 Updated educators’ ethics code addresses social media 

AUSTIN -Teachers must refrain from inappropriately communicating with students through the use of social media under the requirements of an updated Educators’ Code of Ethics endorsed by the State Board of Education today.

The Code of Ethics was updated by the State Board for Educator Certification (SBEC), which oversees educator certification issues. Rules proposed by SBEC must come to the State Board of Education for review before they become effective.

Texas Education Agency staff requested the change to the ethics code because they said they are receiving disciplinary case referrals in which teachers were found to have sent students thousands of text messages.  Sometimes the content of the messages was not inappropriate on their face but the volume of messages and time of day the messages were sent indicated that the educator was “grooming” the student for a future sexual relationship.

A school district employee commits a second-degree felony under Penal Code Section 21.12 if the employee engages in sexual contact with a student who is not their spouse.

The new provision in the Code of Ethics says:

(I) Standard 3.9. The educator shall refrain from inappropriate communication with a student or minor, including, but not limited to, electronic communication such as cell phone, text messaging, email, instant messaging, blogging, or other social network communication. Factors that may be considered in assessing whether the communication is inappropriate include, but are not limited to:

(i) the nature, purpose, timing, and amount of the communication;

(ii) the subject matter of the communication;

(iii) whether the communication was made openly or the educator attempted to conceal the communication;

(iv) whether the communication could be reasonably interpreted as soliciting sexual contact or a romantic relationship;

(v) whether the communication was sexually explicit; and

(vi) whether the communication involved discussion(s) of the physical or sexual attractiveness or the sexual history, activities, preferences, or fantasies of either the educator or the student.

Posted at 7:14 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Ethics, Students, Teacher-Student Communication

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Pass It On Education Tools: Make Posters in Excel

Posted at 6:14 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Pass It On, Pass It On Education Tools, Excel, Posters

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Pass It On Education Content: Word Choice To Spice Up Writing

Help students spice up their writing with these nine lists! 

Check It Out!  Pass It On!

This is what one looks like:

Download all nine below:

Describing Food

How Do You Get Around

How Does It Feel

How Does That Make You Feel

Instead Of Said

Not All Good

Something You Smell

What Do You See, How Does It Look

What Sound Did You Hear

The lists were provided on Teacher Tube by Mrstephenwolfe. 

Check It Out!  Pass It On!

Posted at 5:54 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Pass It On, Education Content, Content, Teachers, Writing, ELA, English

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Guest Post: Unfair argument about the increase in per-pupil spending?

Guest post by Harry Tennant

An often repeated argument critical of public schools is that there has been a significant increase in per-pupil spending without an improvement in academic performance. Time reported 123% increase in per-pupil spending from 1971 - 2006 with 0% change in academic performance (17 year olds, 1971 - 2004 for reading) (p. 35, 9/20/2010). The movie Waiting for Superman repeated similar statistics.

The implication is that public schools are in crisis and spending more money does no good. But has that money been spent on increasing academic performance?

It has been argued that the biggest change in education over the past few decades has been accomodation for special populations. It has not been spent on increasing overall academic achievement.

I'm not suggesting that accomodation for special populations is a bad thing. However, one doesn't improve overall academic performance unless the attention and funding is focused on improving overall academic performance.

Principals and teachers: What has been your experience? Have funding increases that you've seen gone toward overall academic performance? If so, what were the changes that were expected to improve academic performance?

Posted at 7:30 AM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: by Harry Tennant, public schools

Tuesday, November 23, 2010

Research: Is School Funding Fair? A National Report Card

Posted at 7:29 AM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: School Funding, Fairness, National

Monday, November 22, 2010

Pass It On Education Content: Bill of Rights Rock!

Posted at 2:01 PM (permalink) 1 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Pass It On Education Content, Pass It On, Bill of Rights, Social Studies, America

Monday, November 22, 2010

Pass It On Education Content: Poetry Terminology Powerpoint

Posted at 1:28 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Poetry Terminology, English, Pass It On Education Content, Pass It On, ELA

Monday, November 22, 2010

Pass It On Education Content: U.S. Founding Fathers' Papers

US: Founding Fathers' papers to be accessible online
20 October 2010 - The University of Virginia Press is putting the published papers of Washington, Jefferson, John Adams, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, and Benjamin Franklin on a National Archives website that is expected to be accessible to the public in 2012. When complete, the website will allow users to read, browse, and search the text of tens of thousands of documents from early American history.

Website where the papers can be found

Source

Posted at 8:36 AM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: US History, Founding Fathers, Pass It On, Education Content

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Guest Post: Sugata Mitra on Child-Driven Education

Guest post by Harry Tennant

This is a fascinating talk about the learning success  among collaborating students with Internet-connected computers. Check it out.

But one thing we know about learning is that without guidance, you won't see much in the way of accomplishing learning objectives. So, how can we take Mitra's exciting results about unguided learning of something and turn that into exciting results about learning the sorts of things we want students to learn?

Posted at 8:45 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: by Harry Tennant, Child-Driven Education, Mitra

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Education Funny: Testing You

Posted at 9:08 AM (permalink) 1 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Cartoon, Education, Testing, Test

Friday, November 19, 2010

In The News: Survey Finds Wealthy Districts Get Best Teachers

"AUSTIN, Texas (AP) — A survey that measures teacher quality in Texas has found that students in underachieving poor and minority districts are more likely to have under-qualified teachers than those in better-performing, wealthier white districts."

• "In other words," David de la Garza, president of the group, tells the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, "the students who are most in need of the most-qualified teachers are the least likely to be taught by them."

• The Association of Texas Professional Educators presented the report Monday, citing "substantial" differences in teacher quality at more than 5,700 schools surveyed.

• The study measured data from the 2008-2009 school year. It took into account teacher certification test scores, years of experience and length of time in the same teaching position.

• Association officials said that because of the findings, they'll ask the Legislature to give incentive pay increases to attract better qualified teachers to poorer, low-performing districts — maybe in the range of an additional $7,500 to $10,000 a year.

Click here for the full article.

Below see some rather interesting posts I came across on this subject that begin the discussion!  What are your thoughts?

Click here for larger print.

Posted at 8:15 PM (permalink) 0 Comments View/Leave Comment
Keywords: Teacher Pay, Wealthy Districts, Poor Districts, Teacher Quality